Comment by wolvesechoes

This industry pretends to be driven by technical considerations, yet, with some exceptions, is mostly driven by fads, folk knowledge and aesthetic choices.

Folk knowledge may, and often is, grounded in reality and real experience, but let us not forget that most heated debates in programming of today are rooted mostly in tribal logic and fad chasing.

Static vs dynamic typing is a chief example. Empirical evidence that static typing makes some real difference in terms of bugs or safety is inconclusive at best. Yet it doesn't prevent some people from literally shaming those that prefer dynamic languages. Same with OOP - for years it was everywhere, now you may have an impression that it is a sin to ever use it. But now, as much as back then, there is no evidence to support claim that using or not using OOP is "one true way".

Now, memory safety is a real concern, and we can confidently say that we have found ways (exemplified in Rust) to prevent whole class of issues, but suddenly we are in the situation that every single bit of code out there is supposed to put memory safety as a chief concern, no matter if we are talking about some high perf web server, missile control logic, simple script solving Lotka-Volterra equations or simple calculator app.